Mikhail Grigorenko at the NHL Draft Combine late last week.
Frank Gunn/The Canadian Press

The NHL Draft is rapidly approaching, and with the top-prospects in Toronto for the Draft Combine last week, excitement about the event is beginning to crest (especially in Edmonton). Between the upcoming draft, the hiring of Bob Hartley in Calgary, and the Oilers continued search for a head-coach: there were plenty of topics to discuss. Also, there's some meaningful hockey being played apparently, and something called "the Stanley Cup Final" gets a fair bit of air-time as well.

Today the Nation Network would like to announce the winner of the NHLNumbers logo contest - Entry "D" by Gregg Beever. Gregg is a graphic designer and webmaster by trade, but he also publishes a web comic called Inglorious Hipsters, which you should definitely check out. Follow Gregg on twitter here as well.

So far, these playoffs have defied prediction, as our playoff prediction contest tends to demonstrate. Interestingly though, there seems to be a very clear favourite in the series between Los Angeles and New Jersey.

Just over a week ago we announced a contest to design a new NHLNumbers logo. And aside from those designers who castigated us for soliciting spec work or something, the response was fairly positive. We received a number of excellent entries which we have been poring over with serious minds and profound thoughts.

It's too difficult a decision for us, I think, so we'd like reader impressions as well. We'll forgo the easily skew-able web poll in favor of yays or nays in the comments. Share your thoughts and we'll pick the winner from the finalists by the end of the day.

Thanks again to to everyone who participated.

First up we have what was obviously the strongest submission -

Luckily it was from Nations Network owner Wanye Gretz who was therefore ineligible to enter. Nevertheless, he clearly set a pretty high bar.

Hands up anyone who picked an LAK/NJD Stanley Cup final heading into the season. Anyone? Bueller?

It's been an especially odd post-season, with favorites falling and previously apathetic fanbases awakening suddenly to their team's unexpected success. If the Kings win the cup, as they should, will that victory be met with a bang or a whimper in Los Angeles? To be fair to that city, it has been so long since their team enjoyed any notable success that they can be forgiven if they forgot about hockey for awhile.

Allan discussed this and a variety of other topics with Kent Wilson, David Staples, Kirk Luedeke and others on this week's show.